07:55am UK time ~ No sure how much trading/chart watching I will manage today as I have a few meetings scheduled plus a hospital visit but I will report back here if I have any trades.

Asian markets overnight suffered from profit-taking and Monday’s lower U.S. markets together with news just after midnight showed Chinese manufacturing contracted in February – and this will no doubt impact on the European open in a short while after the London FTSE 100 hit another record hight before retreating slightly and across the Atlantic the S&P 500 and Dow Jones 30 indices were slightly down on lower than expected existing home sales numbers. Fresh concerns regarding Greece emerged yesterday as German Chancellor, Angela Merkel felt the need to have a ‘quiet’ word with new Greek Prime Minister Tsipras to try and get him back in line regarding his country’s debt commitments, although this was never going to be an easy ride as he was elected on the fact that he’s not really interested in paying down Greece’s massive debts to the EU and other creditors.  It has been suggested that his country will again run out of money by the middle of next month so this story will dominate market news for a while yet.

Crude oil markets are still on the rise after hitting new lows last week and a weaker Dollar plus various problems in Iran, a key producer, is helping keep prices higher although my daily chart is showing an overbought situation on U.S. WTI Crude so another move down towards $42 looks likely, especially when we see the latest U.S. stock situation tomorrow as storage space is fast running out.  Gold is also enjoying a resurgence as U.S. interest rates look to be staying at their record lows until the end of the year now so investors are needing somewhere else to park their money plus there looks to be renewed buying in China, one the world’s largest consumers of the precious metal.

Market Close Monday 23rd March 2015:   Dow Jones 30  -11.61 @ 18,116.04  S&P 500  -3.68 @ 2,104.42  NASDAQ  -12.99 @ 4,444.54  FTSE 100  +75.35 @ 7,037.67  UK AIM  +0.28 @ 716.17  DAX 30  -143.53 @ 11,895.84  CAC 40  -32.97 @ 5,054.52  IBEX  +33.20 @ 11,452.80   Nikkei 225 (Today)  -40.91 @ 19,713.45  Hang Seng (currently)  -80.51 @ 24,414.00

09:10am  ~  Just had a quick look at my selection of favourite charts and the only excitement is a possible trendFX trade setting up on my Brent Crude and WTI charts. I was going for a cycle ride but I’ll hang on a while.

09:20am  ~  I am now in a Brent Crude ‘long’ position with a 31 pip stop loss – a trade on my WTI Crude triggered as well but I would just be ‘doubling-up’ as both charts move broadly in the same direction.

11:10am  ~  The upward momentum on my Brent chart has stalled for a while so I am now out of my position with a +49 pip profit. Off for a quick cycle ride before lunch.

17:30pm  ~  Been out at meetings etc. this afternoon but back home now so going to watch my S&P 500 chart and do some ‘Trade With A Day Job’ trading.

18:05pm  ~  In a ‘short’ trade on the S&P using the ‘standard’ TWADJ set-up. My stop loss is 19 pips.

18:55pm  ~  Just came out of my evening trade – it has managed +27 pips, so a total of +76 pips for the day.